My sister is odd....[Belarus] [Flashback]

The supernatural could be quite humorously silly if not deathly terrifying. Yet…the living had always proved far more horrifying than the spirits who roamed around them. Darkness laid deep in every soul waiting for the chance to appear. Ivan, himself, had done some questionable actions, and yet he felt justified for such actions had been taken upon him in the past. At least the living had the opportunity to die, while Ivan had been force to live out his death over and over and over and over again from one cruelty to another. Laughter, blood, touching, pain, and darkness. It played on repeat for months that turned into years, yet even when he escaped such horror, he stumbled onto more. There was evil in people’s hearts, and yes, it terrified Ivan. It’s why he stockpiled so many weapons. It’s why he needed more. He needed to be stronger and protect himself from the nightmare, from America. He could not let him win the arms race.

He knew fear for he felt it every day of his life, and a spirit who managed to sneak herself/himself/itself into her sister’s body represented only a drop in the large raging ocean. He looked upon her with a sweet smile as she spoke about his treacherous sister. He had done nothing to his sister. She had brought her situation on herself. If only she were grateful, but those in ignorance do not know how truly blissful their life is until it has been shattered around them. “The relationship between my sister and I, is ours alone,” his smile stayed sweetly on his face.

Her words are easily understood and while he had not spoken the tongue himself in many centuries, he still knew how to do so. It did give him knowledge of the spirits age, and while spirits do not frighten him, he knows those with greater age usually have greater power. As she explained herself, his smile grew and he tilted his head. He didn’t particularly care if the opportunity had arisen. He had been in the middle of something, and she had so rudely interrupted. Anger could certainly be caught through his fake happiness, it practically rolled off of him, as it often did during World Conference when America would say something idiotic. Though he took note to his sister being a seer. He had suspected something of the sort with the way her eyes would occasionally look at something that was not there. He wondered if that how she spread the messages to America. She would tell one of her spirit friends to run off to America’s house where the man would pretend to be afraid, but rather be receiving information. It all was coming together.

“Interesting, I don’t believe I care,” he said with a childish grin as he moved forward, his pipe scrapping across the wood floors, “If you wish to play my sister, I suppose I will treat you as I planned to treat her.” With breath taking speed, his pipe slashed through the air, aiming right for his sister’s shadowy head with the full strength of a Super Power.

Spirit. They were quite distasteful. They strangely circulated around his family like an infestation. He would have preferred if Natalya had spoken more freely about her curse. It explained why often he felt the suffocating wait of spiritual presence, stalking and watching them. He would have to find a way to fix her problem. He could rip her eyes from her sockets, could that help with her sight? He would try and see. After all, one cannot learn without trying the action first.

A certain frightening aura loomed over the room. He could sense it gnawing on his skin, causing the hair to rise on the back of his neck and the air to travel with a chill. It told him to flee and hide, to pray until the threatening being leaves, yet he never made a move to do so, matching each mechanical movement of hers with his own forced sweet expression. Running had been a time in the past, running, hiding, tears…so many tears…he had been young the snow coming up to his waist as he ran through the trees, panting heavily, glancing back to see if they had noticed his escape seen him run. He could hear the steady hooves of horses burying through snow and brush, as he pushed through as far as he could. The tingling sensation on his skin told him, he should not go forward, he should go back, and yet the sounds behind told him forward. He kept going until his foot caught a root, and he face planted in the snow. He choked on his sobs, as he tried to get back up, only to wince and fall back down.

“No..no..” he whimpered.

A long thin finger reached out and touched his cheek, trailing down to his chin, causing a sharp wave of frost to bite at his blood. His eyes shot up, as his body told him danger, warned him to run, told him to leave, and yet all Ivan could see was hope as he stared up at the large bearded spirit in a tattered cloak that blended into the wind. “Save me please. Please,” he had begged, his hands reaching out to him.

Why would I, General Winter, help a nation? I do not like your kind, and you are a small one at that, the old spirit spoke cruel as he looked over the boy’s face.

Large tears streamed down his cheek, freezing before they fell, creating a trail of ice. “Please, Mr. General…I’m all alone…I am all alone…there are so many…they…please, I need help. I’ll do anything,” he begged, reaching up for his only strand of hope.

The General looked down upon him with cold eyes, his finger wiping a tear, turning it to a snowflake as it flew into the air. Ivan did not know what had gone through General Winters mind at that moment, yet he saw a flicker of something in those forever frozen eyes, and deep in his bone, he thought he might have felt the words.

I am alone too.

Except they were never spoken, instead General Winter lifted up in the large shadowy figure and said simply, I will protect you, child.

If the terror of General Winter could not chase a small boy away than the horror of a random, weaker, spirit would have no effect on a grown strong nation. The warning lost to him like whispers in the air, hardly recognized or noticed. Even as darkness consumed him, lights shuttered around, and voices screeched and screamed, he numbed them the same he did when he visited the Gulags. His focus staying on red, red, red. He wanted the red, to rip apart and bleed into the flooring. His pipe whisked in the air, and with his full force of nuclear strength the pipe stopped.

The words vibrated through his entire form, and he felt his own anger teetering towards the edge. His sister belonged to him, and him alone. If he wished to beat her like a dog, he had all right to do so. She belonged to him. She would always belong to him. Not these spirits. His sharp violet eyes darkened, watching as the creature his sister had now become pulled back and sauntered around him in an arrogant matter. The taunts continued, and his hand tightened along his pipe. He could feel his own form shaking with rage, as he stared at his sister who was not his sister. His smile twitched with each passing second. “Silly. Silly. Silly spirits. Oh so silly!” he practically laughed, “You walk this world, this land, this Earth! You watch, observe, tweak, and yet you don’t realize! I have the power!” His laughter became slightly unstable, as his hands lifted into the air, as if holding the Earth up himself. “I have the power to destroy it all! Why do you think he chose me?”

He tilted his head, with the same sweet smile, still staring at her dark red eyes. “Aw, you woke him too…that’s quite unfortunate…he is never pleasant during the summer,” he spoke casually, almost with a hint of sarcastic worry for the poor spirit.  The front door behind Russia burst in. Snow, wind, and ice filled the entire room, as dark clouds loomed over the house.

The spirits mock and laugh, and Ivan only responded with a bright sadistic smile. Power pulsed through his blood and form to the point he felt like he held the very world in his hand. He did, after all. Only he, held the power to protect it from all forces, and the only force that threatened him was not a misguided spirit, but a blond idiot with the same power as he. He could ignite this world in flames, and if someone were to destroy Ivan, he would take the rest of the world with him. He laughed at the words. Oh he knew Natalya deserved better. No matter the amount of power he held in his grip, an underneath insecurity would always force him to do more, try harder, and accomplish the impossible. But though his sister deserved better, the fact of the matter was that there was no one better. Only Ivan had the ability to protect her. Only Ivan! Russia! Not the west! Not America!

Certainly not a pathetic spirit. “I would rather see my sister torn limb from limb than watch her mind succumb to such inadequacy,” he answered clearly and sweetly, for he would. He would destroy her perfect figure in multiple deaths until the spirits themselves exhausted of their efforts. The cold quieted him like a mother placing their blanket around their child. The ground froze around them, and the windows burst with continued wind and snow. The pictures frosted over and the tables turned to ice. The room became a winter wonderland in the middle of summer, though with General Winter, there was little wonder or beauty in it. Only hatred, death, and strength.

General Winters long cloak encompassed around Ivan, as he himself stood tall in the air. The old spirit looked darkly down at the others in the room. He hardly cared for the nickname, and it became evident in the slight twitch in his nose. “Why have you awoken me?!” he growled deeply in response to the spirits jeers. His form glaring at Natalya. “To spout threats! He, and all that belongs to him, belongs to me!”

The wind increased whipping against the shadows in the room.

Ivan almost looked like a boy in a candy shop, a playful gleam in his violet eyes and a bright smile on his lips. Better yet, he looked like a child with a baseball bat in a china shop. His hands flexed in and out of a fist, stretching the leather of his gloves. The reasons for the spirit presence did not matter to him. The spirt did not belong there, and he would remove it physically if need be. His sister would have to thank him for all of his help. “I am Big Brother. She will always be safe with me,” he answered to the spirit’s taunt. For what did the spirit know? It knew nothing of the current situation and threats far greater than it. His home had to be unified if they wished to fight it.

General Winter’s long fingers fell upon Ivan’s shoulders, steadying and silencing him. It sent a sharp chill down his back. He did not fight his demands. The old General was cruel and horrid, but he had protected Ivan even when he had been weak and foolish. He trusted him, the very few souls he truly trusted, and so he stood, waiting. General Winter did not have patience for other spiritual creatures. He preferred his own domain, and rarely associated with another one. He knew Russia’s sister to be a seer, and it had disappointed him. Spirits attach and follow those who can see them, and he would prefer his Russia to not have interaction with such pointless things. He had his own plans for Russia and others would not interfere.

General Winter was not pleased by its answer, and the room chilled to below freezing temperatures. Ice started to attack the girl’s feet. I do not repeat myself, he growled, an underlying threat. As the threat left his cold form, the presence in front of him shifted and a different voice spoke. He did not interfere, only watched. Even Ivan tilted his head curiously, listening through the inward battle, until Natalya appeared to be the only one in front of them. Ivan smiled to see the problem leave, but General Winter looked annoyed. Time wasted over a pathetic seer. He wished to kill her, if doing so to a nation were so easily accomplished. He let out a low growl before whipping his cape behind him and disappearing from the room like a rushed wind, the cold winding out with him, yet lingering in the air.

Ivan giggled at the scene, not caring about the General’s mood. When he awoke in winter, he suspected the General would still be holding a grudge, but such a time was months away. Instead, he walked towards his sister. “You have been quite a troublemaker today, little sister,” he said causally.

Ivan knew of spirits that lingered around them. He did not possess his sister’s ability to see them, but after giving himself to General Winter, he learned more of their existence. As long as they did not interfere with his goals, he did not care for their burdens and agreed with the General who claimed all spirits to be tiresome and desperate. Ivan could not say he was surprised by his sisters ability, not that he knew she possessed it. However, he did hold his suspicions. In their youth, his sister would sometime stare at nothing as if something was there. She never spoke to whatever she saw, but he would catch a slight nod or tilt of head as if assessing a new presence. He brushed it off as his sister’s oddities. His sister had always been strange. Then again, their family seemed to have connections to spirits that other nations did not, and so the fact of seeing his sister possessed had barely made him bat an eye.

He stopped a foot away from her, smile still intact, and eyes still cheerfully sparkling as he stared down at his troublesome little sister. He listened to her numb words with a brief instance of confusion. He did not know why she shared this tidbit of information. Was she attempting to compare his home environment to that of Lithuania’s home environment? If she was, he found it quite rude of her. He cared for Toris, but Toris was not family. He could not provide a proper home for his spying backstabbing sister as Ivan could. “You lost control, yes?” he commented cheerfully, “Spirits can be quite fickle. I did not know you to hold such a connection. I am learning there are many things I do not know about you, little sister.” There was an edge in his voice, a slight threat, but he made no move. “If you were more honest with me, you might not have lost control. I know how difficult it can be to be caught in a lie. Big brother wants to help you.”

He finally held out his hand in between them, waiting for her to take his hand. “I want to help you return to our family. You only have to tell me the truth and explain all you have shared. I will not punish. I only want to know what you have told him. You can do so, yes?” he said, offering a rare olive branch to a traitor, almost suspiciously because Ivan held little tolerance for betrayal. Then again, Natalya was family. He would always make exceptions for family.